


Mirounga angustirostris

by Mugatu



Series: Wildlife Photographers AU [1]
Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, the one where they're wildlife photographers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-02 17:25:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17268305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mugatu/pseuds/Mugatu
Summary: They’re in Big Sur of all places when Paul nearly dies. Later Daryl will find it blackly hilarious that after years of shooting everything from great whites to grizzly bears it’s a goddamned elephant seal that nearly does Paul in. It’s not the first time Daryl’s witnessed Paul in danger— no matter how careful and respectful they are their subjects are still wild animals that tend to reside in environments not meant for humans. Daryl’s even had a fair share of brushes with death himself; but Paul’s encounter with a rogue elephant seal is more of a “hardcore grinding session” with death.AKA the one where Daryl and Jesus are wildlife photographers who met while on assignment.**REVISED 1/16/2019**





	Mirounga angustirostris

They’re in Big Sur of all places when Paul nearly dies. Later Daryl will find it blackly hilarious that after years of shooting everything from great whites to grizzly bears it’s a goddamned elephant seal that nearly does Paul in. It’s not the first time Daryl’s witnessed Paul in danger— no matter how careful and respectful they are their subjects are still wild animals that tend to reside in environments not meant for humans. Daryl’s even had a fair share of brushes with death himself; but Paul’s encounter with a rogue elephant seal is more of a “hardcore grinding session” with death.

It should never have even happened at all for a number of reasons, first being that Paul knows how to approach dangerous wildlife without provoking an attack. Secondly he knows how to approach these particular animals _specifically_ as they photographed southern elephant seals—which are even bigger and more aggressive than their northern brethren—in Patagonia less than two years ago. Finally, they aren’t there to photograph elephant seals and have no reason to think they’ll even _see_ one. Especially a two ton adult male; October is too early in the season for them to haul out and the main colonies are further south near San Simeon. Their soft-as-hell assignment that day is fucking _sea otters._ Animals that while not as harmless as their adorable little faces make them seem give Daryl no reason to suspect that the day will end with him almost becoming a fucking widower.

A fucking widower after barely a month of marriage. The timing is suspect enough that Daryl can’t decide whether getting married on impulse was a curse or some kind of premonition. Gay marriage has been legal everywhere for more than a year, they’d talked about it but hadn’t gotten around to actually going through with a ceremony, and they did it in just the nick of time for Paul to nearly die.Paul leans toward the latter, since getting married was his idea and Daryl is able to avoid a lot of red tape at the hospital just by saying, “my husband” instead of “my partner”. Daryl reluctantly admits he has a point; 

What finally made them go through with it was the rental company wanting them to buy separate insurance plans for the jeep. Normally when they went on assignment shit like that was covered by their employer as part of daily expenses but  they’d decided to stretch this trip out into an actual vacation so the magazine would only be covering the first week. After an hour of frustrated arguing with the rental company Paul turned to Daryl and said, “Fuck it. Let’s just get married, they'll let us both be on the same plan if we are.” They went down to the courthouse and signed the paperwork that afternoon. Two weeks in Big Sur driving up the Pacific Coast Highway camping among the redwoods and fucking works even better as a honeymoon than a regular vacation. Except for the part where on the second day shooting adorable sea otters Paul is drowned by a rogue elephant seal.

Daryl is onshore with his own camera out when it happens. They have the beach to themselves that morning, most tourists are gone by late October. It’s stupidly romantic, and Daryl is shooting Paul as he photographs the otters. Aside from wild animals hisfavorite subject to photograph is Paul, and after ten years together he’s taken literally thousands of pictures of his husband. Paul is having the time of his life in the water and Daryl has already captured dozens of shots that will make it into what he’s dubbed the “Daryl Dixon is the Luckiest Man Alive” collection. Highlights of this collection include: a baby elephant with its trunk stretched out booping Paul on the nose taken at an elephant orphanage in Nairobi; Paul stretched out on his stomach in the snow aiming his camera at a curious Arctic fox that is sniffing at the telephoto lens; Paul taking a selfie with a Florida scrub jay perched on his head.

Today Daryl’s favorite image is one he captures of Paul floating in the water with his snorkeling mask pushed on top of his head and laughing at a particularly cute sea otter. The lighting and angle are both perfect, he captures Paul’s crooked smile and bright eyes the same color as the ocean he’s swimming in. The sea otter looks like it’s laughing as well, its mouth open and little paws clutching its face. It’s an amazing shot, one worthy of submission into dozens of different photo contests but Daryl knows he’ll never show it to anyone. The images contained in the “Daryl Dixon is the Luckiest Man Alive” collection are for his eyes alone.

Amazing as the shot is Daryl can’t look at it later without remembering Paul almost fucking dying. Or remembering that his own reaction when the surface of the water explodes and a four thousand pound elephant seal rears out of the water is to snap a quick picture. _That_ shot ends up in the pages of _National Geographic_ at Paul’s insistence; it’s a stunning image that's equal parts horrifying and hilarious. The elephant seal looks wild-eyed and deranged, its mouth open and its nose that looks like nothing so much as a flaccid, wrinkled, old man's dick flopping in its face. It’s looming behind Paul who is jerking forward in instinctual fright, eyes wide and mouth open in a weird mirror of the seal.

Paul shouts, then flounders toward the shore, swim fin kicking out. The wrinkly old bastard slams into Paul and pushes him underneath the water. All of it happens so fast, a series of events clicking by like a camera in burst mode. Daryl stands on the shore frozen with his camera still raised to his eye for a strange amount of time that feels like minutes but is seconds. Then he throws his two thousand dollar camera aside without a second thought and jumps into the water.

The ocean is cold as balls and Daryl is glad he’s already in his wetsuit despite planning to spend most of the day onshore. They both have their specialties and Paul is better at working in the water. Daryl still knows what he’s doing, and is a strong swimmer even without fins or a mask. Paul’s only about twenty feet from shore and Daryl reaches the spot where he was dragged under in seconds. The water’s clear and shallow enough that Daryl can make out the massive shape of the seal. He takes in a quick breath and dives. He swims straight down, the salt water stings his open eyes and everything is blurry and distorted. It’s still hard to miss the blubbery asshole that’s pinned Paul to the ocean floor. It almost looks like its hugging him and its massive jaws are closed on Paul’s shoulder rig. Without his gear it probably would have grabbed Paul’s fucking head.

Daryl has nothing except for a pitiful four-inch utility knife strapped to his calf that has seen the most use as an improvised tool for fixing camera equipment. He has no illusions of seriously injuring it; elephant seals have tough hides over thick layers of blubber and the males spend the months of the breeding season ripping each other to shreds. He just wants it to let go of Paul even if it means Daryl ends up taking his place pinned to the rocky ocean floor. It doesn’t work; Daryl’s clumsy slashes are about as effective as a fly buzzing around an actual elephant’s head. He still tries until his lungs cry out for air and he has to return to the surface for a quick breath before swimming back down. In the end Daryl’s efforts aren’t what causes the wrinkly turd to let go and swim off; it’s that Paul’s gone limp and stopped struggling. The seal swims away almost leisurely, not sparing Daryl a second glance. He doesn’t waste time wondering about it, just grabs Paul and drags him to the surface in a lifeguard’s clutch.

As he hauls Paul to the shore he hears himself shouting out nonsense like, “Motherfucker if you’re dead I’m gonna fuckin’ _kill you!”_ When they reach theshore Daryl’s not able to form words because Paul isn’t breathing and this fact wipes out most of his higher brain functions. He switches to pure instinct and training then. Paul’s shoulder rig is still attached to him somehow and Daryl’s pretty sure he breaks something important as he rips it off. He’s lost his own knife so he has to grab the one strapped to Paul’s calf to cut his wetsuit open and start CPR. Five quick rescue breaths followed by two minutes of chest compressions. He’s not pleading dramatically for Paul to breathe like a character in a movie, it’s all automatic and robotic.

After this preliminary round of CPR he jumps to his feet and lunges for their pile of equipment a few feet away. Thankfully his iPhone is sitting out easily accessible and he’s back at Paul’s side in seconds. He yells out, “Siri, call 911,” and goes back to CPR. The robot voice cheerfully replies, “Alright. Calling emergency services in five seconds.” Daryl thinks wildly that he’ll never make fun of Paul for drinking the Apple Kool-Ade ever again as he counts out chest compressions. He goes through three cycles consisting of thirty chest compressions followed by two rescue breaths before Paul makes a choking noise and his chest jumps. Daryl quickly turns him to his side and tilts his head as he starts coughing up sea water. When Daryl is sure he’s breathing he becomes aware that the stupid robot assistant has done its job, he can hear the tinny sound of the dispatcher asking what his emergency is and if he can hear her coming from speakers.

“Yeah, I can hear you! I need an ambulance, my stupid fucking husband just drowned.” The dispatcher tells him she’s already sent an ambulance based on the phone’s GPS coordinates and Daryl is able to give her better directions to the secluded beach they're at. He answers her questions on Paul’s condition tersely—no, he’s not conscious but yes, he’s breathing, yes it was a fucking elephant seal and not a sea lion. “I know I sound like a dumb redneck but I c’n tell the difference ‘tween a two ton _Mirounga angustirostris_ and a seven hundred pound _Zalophus californianus.”_ He’s not really paying the operator much attention despite his irritation; their conversation may as well be happening to someone else on the other side of the planet. Most of Daryl is focused on the steady rise and fall of Paul’s chest. As he watches it their entire fucking life together flashes before his eyes.

Seeing Paul for the first time over ten years ago on a cargo plane headed to Antarctica where they'd both be working for the next five months. Paul wearing the standard red parka and a stupid black cap with ear flaps tied around it but was still so beautiful he knocked Daryl's breath right out of him. They didn't actually _meet_ on that plane no matter what Paul says, didn't meet for days after that. Daryl’s first impression of Paul when they  _did_ meet was that he was a cocky little shit; the kid was twenty-four and if he didn’t have the beard would have looked fifteen but still tried to brag about his photography skills and all the awards he'd already won. For the first month the little bastard followed Daryl around McMurdo trying to show him his work and asking him to collaborate on a project. The world of freelance wildlife photography was and is competitive, full of a lot of macho posturing and oversized egos so Daryl didn’t realize that Paul was actually showing off in an attempt to get into his pants. Not until Paul finally got tired of it and one day flatly propositioned him, something he would later admit he was only able to do because they were stuck on the ice and there was nowhere to run.

Daryl remembers the first time they made love, being so nervous and excited his hands shook when he laid them on Paul’s bare skin. He was eleven years Paul’s senior but far less experienced. Daryl wasn’t really “out” back in those days; just to his friends and the embarrassingly small number of men he’d been with. None of those men had been as beautiful as Paul, whose layers of cold weather gear hid the muscular little body of a gymnast.

More memories; ones of discovering just how well they worked together _outside_ of the bedroom, setting up the perfect shot and having the patience and determination to keep going when they failed to catch that perfect shot. Their backgrounds were superficially different but they both had a all-consuming passion for wilderness and the creatures that inhabited it. Daryl told Paul about growing up in rural Georgia with his shitty daddy, learning to hunt almost before he learned to walk. Spotting all sorts of critters out their that he didn't want to kill but was still fascinated by--birds, foxes, insects, even deer that were too young. "I used to tell my Meemaw about everything I saw and she gave me her Kodak Duaflex that was older’n god for my eleventh birthday. Haven’t stopped shooting since.” He told Paul about Dr. Greene, about how that man was the reason Daryl was  _really_ able to become a photographer as well as the reason he'd ended up on the ice.

Paul told Daryl about growing up as an orphan in Chicago rotating through a group home and various foster parents who were varying degrees of shitty. How he got into diving first then shortly after that photography, how he stole the camera he was still using ten years later from a particularly shitty foster father. “Started out doing street photography but I got bored with people _real_ fast. Wildlife was much more interesting, and _challenging._ ”

“Lotta wildlife in the city?” Daryl asked.

Paul grinned, “If you know where to look. I climbed up the sides of buildings to take pictures of a nest of falcons and snuck out of the group home at night to hunt down coyotes and crows. Made friends with the crows, it's actually pretty easy to do. They used to bring me weird shit, almost like they were paying me for the bread crumbs I threw at them.” One of his photos of an urban coyote won the grand prize of a National Geographic student photographer contest. Said prize was a two week photography workshop in Yosemite, his first exposure to real wilderness. “After that the city got very boring very fast.”

More memories of that trip to Antarctica, all of them to do with fucking. They fucked _constantly_ , every minute they weren’t working or editing the day’s photos was spent in a tiny dorm room exploring each other’s bodies. Daryl ended up swapping with Paul’s roommate after the poor guy walked in on them the second time. Kal bore no hard feelings and is their friend to this day, an absurd amount of fucking goes down during a season in Antarctica. Inevitable result of small groups of people locked up in close quarters for months and going stir crazy. Usually it ends with the season,  people go back to their normal lives and leave their affairs behind on the ice. He and Paul could have ended up like that if a week before they were set to leave Daryl hadn't found his nut sack and asked Paul if he wanted to keep this thing going. Just for a little while, until one of them found their next gig.

Daryl spent the next year refusing to let Paul run away every time he tried. Ten years and the remaining six continents later they’re getting married in the little courthouse in Dahlonega, Georgia where they own a cabin. It’s not “home”—that’s everywhere in the world they’re together—but it’s a good place to stash their gear and enjoy their rare moments of downtime. In that time they’ve rarely spent more than a week or two apart; most of the time they’re able to go on assignment together. They’ve been back to Antarctica four times on short assignments, the last time three years ago and they are due for a trip back. 

****************

In the back of an ambulance speeding toward the hospital in Monterey Daryl mentally promises that they will go back to the ice next year or the year after. Almost as soon as he’s finished that thought Paul regains consciousness. He stares around him bleary-eyed as the EMTs fuss over him, asking questions and taking his vitals. When they’re done the first thing he asks Daryl is, “What’d you do with our gear?”

“It’s back on the beach,” Daryl admits.

“ _All_ of it? Are you serious?” Paul asks. Their combined equipment acquired over the years is  _expensive;_ the gear left on the beach is only part of it but it's still worth over ten thousand dollars.

“So sorry for saving your life instead, you little asshole,” Daryl snaps, even as he leans over the gurney and takes Paul’s hand.

“Couldn’t you have done that without losing our equipment?” Paul rasps out, tightening his fingers around Daryl’s own. “What happened to my camera? Did that bloated turd break it?”

“It made it to the beach, I’ll go back for our stuff tomorrow, should still be there. Place is deserted. If not everything’s insured.”

“Our photos aren’t insured,” Paul fires back, “Please tell me you got a shot of that monster that nailed me, no one will believe it otherwise.” His voice is hoarse but Daryl can hear the note of playfulness in it.

“Of course I did,” Daryl says, professional pride warring with guilt, “and if it comes out I’m going to print it out and throw darts at it. Hope that dicknosed fuck’s future involves a pod of pissed off killer whales.”

“I’m telling Aaron you called them that instead of orcas,” Paul says, his lips twitching and his eyelids drifting closed. 

Daryl huffs out a laugh and says, “Tell ‘im whatever you want.”

“On second thought, nah,” Paul says, eyes fully closed, “Don’t wanna break our ice husband’s heart.”

Daryl laughs again, “Breaking your all terrain husband’s heart by drowning is fine, I guess.”

“This wasn’t my fault,” Paul murmurs, “But I’m sorry anyway.”

“Yeah, I know,” Daryl says, throat tightening suddenly and humor leaving him. He bends over and kisses Paul’s hand, not giving a fuck that the EMTs are watching.

***************

The rest of their vacation slash honeymoon plans are torpedoed. Paul has to stay in the hospital for two days of observation and is ordered to remain within a reasonable distance of medical care for two weeks after _that_. He bitches that he feels fine but Daryl ignores him. The doctors have impressed on them that there’s a real danger of death from secondary lung infection so Daryl makes the executive decision that there will be absolutely no wilderness exploration for Paul on this trip. When Paul protests Daryl glares him into submission, saying that watching Paul die once was enough and he refuses to do it again just because his husband is stupid and stubborn.

When Paul is discharged Daryl’s able to get them a room at a nice bed and breakfast in Monterey that’s ten minutes’ drive from the hospital. It costs a fucking fortune but it has an ocean view and he hopes that will be enough to keep Paul occupied for the remainder of their trip. Paul hates being cooped up, especially when they’re right next to hundreds of miles of wilderness just begging to be explored. They’d only gotten a taste of it and lord knows when they’ll be this side of the world again, when this trip is finished they have an assignment in Mexico, a month of downtime around the holidays, and after that they're booked solid until the summer. 

Daryl’s able to keep Paul from running off but has to endure a lot of bitching. The ocean view helps, as does the fact that Daryl is able to retrieve their equipment. It sat out for the two days that Paul was in the hospital but miraculously everything is still there. They spend a great deal of the remainder of their honeymoon going over their photographs on Paul’s laptop. Predictably, Paul’s favorite is the one taken right before a rogue elephant seal drowned him. “You’re amazing, babe,” Paul says, fascinated, “The light’s _perfect,_ I can’t believe this is the only one you took. Most people couldn’t get a shot like this if they took hundred.”

“Kinda want to delete it,” Daryl mutters.

“Don’t you fucking dare!” Paul says, staring at him incredulously, “Why would you even want to?”

Daryl stares at him, “Maybe ‘cause you almost died, and my first response was to take a damn picture?”

Paul rolls his eyes, “Whatever. If you saw that shot and hadn’t taken it I would’ve killed you anyways.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies for anyone familiar with animal behavior; this was inspired by an encounter with an elephant seal that wildlife photographer Paul Nicklen (google him, he's awesome) said nearly killed him but *liberties* were definitely taken. Liberties were also taken with recovery from near drowning. 
> 
> Side note: If you ever get the chance to drive the Pacific Coast Highway I recommend a stop at the elephant seal colony in San Simeon. Late October is when juvenile males haul out; and you can witness their hilarious posturing and fake fighting, like a group of teenage boys daring each other to start some shit.


End file.
